Sports Politics

In 1963, the West Indian Marxist C.L.R. James posed the deceptively benign question: "What do they know of cricket, who only cricket know?" A challenge to the public to reconsider cricket and its meaning by placing the game in its true social, political, and economic context. Different Class does not simply challenge the widely accepted orthodoxy of English cricket, it demonstrates how the values and belief systems at its heart were intentionally developed in order to divide the English along class lines at every level of the game.

Why is the athlete so important to us? Few public figures can dominate the public imagination with such power and authority. Drawing from art, literature, politics, and history, Something like the Gods explores the powerful grip the athlete has always held on the Western imagination. Amidon examines the archetype of the competitor as it evolved from antiquity to the present day, from athlete-warriors such as Achilles and Ulysses to global media icons like Ali, Jordan, and Tiger Woods.

Dass es in der Welt des Fußballs immer weniger um den Sport und immer mehr um schmutzige Geschäfte geht, ahnen die Fans nicht erst seit den Skandalen um die Fifa und die vermeintlich gekaufte WM 2006 in Deutschland. Die "Football Leaks" bieten nun erstmals Einblicke in die Schattenwelt der Branche, offenkundig wird die grenzenlose Gier, die hinter den Kulissen des Weltfußballs herrscht.

FEAT DESC

The extraordinary story of how Coach Paul "Bear" Bryant and Joe Namath, his star quarterback at the University of Alabama, led the Crimson Tide to victory and transformed football into a truly national pastime. During the bloodiest years of the civil rights movement, Bear Bryant and Joe Namath - two of the most iconic and controversial figures in American sports - changed the game of college football forever.

Patrick S. Washburn and Chris Lamb tell the full story of the past, the present, and to a degree, the future of American sports journalism. Sports Journalism chronicles how and why technology, religion, social movements, immigration, racism, sexism, social media, athletes, and sportswriters and broadcasters changed sports as well as how sports are covered and how news about sports are presented and disseminated.

Dass Fußball-Weltmeisterschaften unter merkwürdigen Umständen vergeben werden, ist keine Neuigkeit - hier sei nur an die "Vorgänge" um das deutsche "Sommermärchen" erinnert. Aber als der Fußball-Weltverband FIFA die WM ins kleine, reiche Emirat Katar vergab, verstanden auch die skandalresistentesten Fußballfans die Welt nicht mehr. In "Boykottiert Katar!" fasst das Autorenduo Beyer/Schulze-Marmeling - anderthalb Jahre vor Start der Wüsten-WM - die Katar-Kontroverse kompakt zusammen und beleuchtet auch bis dato weniger bekannte Aspekte. Für alle, die ab jetzt mitreden wollen.

Highlighted by the ESPN basketball documentary Black Magic, Ben Jobe's life and philosophy are captured in Staying Ahead of the Posse. This is history in the flesh, the history of basketball and the Civil Rights Movement, of desegregation and economic exploitation, of African independence and the modern-day plantation that is the American sports industry in general and the NCAA in particular. Ben's 40-plus years of coaching, teaching, nurturing, and mentoring intersected with and was influenced by all those factors.

Ahmed und Hussen Chaer sind Wrestling-Stars - und doch ganz anders als die meisten Erfolgssportler. Die Flucht des Vaters aus dem Libanon, eine Kindheit im Kreuzberger Hinterhaus, ihr Einsatz gegen Vorurteile und Ausgrenzung: All das hat die unzertrennlichen Brüder geprägt - und macht sie zu sympathischen Streitern für eine bessere Welt.

The National Basketball Association is a place where white fans and Black players enact virtually every racial issue and tension in US culture. Following the Seattle SuperSonics for an entire season, David Shields explores how, in a predominantly Black sport, White fans - including especially himself - think about and talk about Black heroes, Black scapegoats, and Black bodies. Critically acclaimed and highly controversial, Black Planet was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the PEN USA Award, and was named one of the Top Ten Nonfiction Books of 1999.

Set against a backdrop of social change during the 1970s, State is a compelling first-person account of what it was like to live through both traditional gender discrimination in sports and the joy of the very first days of equality - or at least the closest that one high school girls’ basketball team ever came to it.

In full and intricate detail, featuring an amazing cast of characters from the worlds of politics, athletics, entertainment and more, this is the story of how President Theodore Roosevelt helped shepherd in a sports and fitness revolution that forever changed the complexion of the United States.

This audiobook reflects upon the martial arts as it was hundreds of years ago, before it became popular in the West and people were awarded ranks in astonishingly short periods of time. This audiobook speaks about the true spirit of the martial arts...when it should be used and when it shouldn't; it accurately recounts the history of a number of mainstream martial arts and then goes on to put forth the philosophy of "Christians in the Martial Arts".

Shawn Harrington returned to Marshall High School as an assistant coach years after appearing as a player in the iconic basketball documentary film Hoop Dreams. In January of 2014, Marshall's struggling team was about to improve after the addition of a charismatic but troubled player. Everything changed, however, when two young men opened fired on Harrington's car as he drove his daughter to school. Harrington was struck and paralyzed. The mistaken-identity shooting was followed by a series of events that had a devastating impact on Harrington and Marshall's basketball family.

Twenty-five celebrated writers share the inspiring words and timeless wisdom of the athletic coaches who changed and influenced their lives and pass on the sage advice they received.

Pro basketball player Rasheed Wallace often exclaimed the pragmatic truth "Ball don't lie!" during a game. It is a protest against a referee's bad calls. But the slogan, which originated in pickup games, brings the reality of a racialized urban playground into mainstream American popular culture.

How Football Explains America is a fascinating, first-of-its-kind journey through the making of America's most complex, intriguing, and popular game. ESPN’s Sal Paolantonio explores just how crucial football is to understanding the American psyche. Paolantonio tackles varying American themes from Manifest Destiny to “fourth and one” as he goes deep in order to answer the age-old question: Why does America love football so much?

Pete Axthelm follows the 1969 - 70 season of the New York Knicks and provides a parallel focus on basketball as it was then played in the black neighborhoods of New York City. Throughout, he writes clearly, intelligently, and passionately about the game, bringing alive the players’ efforts, accomplishments, and failures.

On the street, every ballplayer has a story. Onaje X. O. Woodbine, a former streetball player who became an all-star Ivy Leaguer, brings the sights and sounds, hopes and dreams of street basketball to life. He shows that big games have a trickster figure and a master of Black talk whose commentary interprets the game for audiences. The beats of hip-hop and reggae make up the soundtrack, and the ballplayers are half men, half heroes, defying the ghetto's limitations with their flights to the basket.

In an increasingly secular, fragmented, and distracted culture, nothing brings Americans together quite like sports. On Sundays in September, more families worship at the altar of the NFL than at any church. This appeal, which cuts across all demographic and ideological lines, makes sports perhaps the last unifying mass ritual of our era, with huge numbers of people all focused on the same thing at the same moment. That timeless, live quality makes sports very powerful, and very lucrative. And the media spectacle around them is only getting bigger, brighter, and noisier.